In your opinion, do you think it is acceptable for one's main character or main characters to mirror one's own personality.

How much of your own life do you put into your work? Would you agree that it is inevitable for a writer to end up spilling portions of his or her personal life into his or her work coded by the plot and characters?

How do you make your characters so realistic? Would you say that you have a great understanding of people in general?

How did you get started working with the anime industry?

What are some of your other talents?

In Blast of Tempest, who raised Aika-chan before she was adopted by Mahiro's parents? In the anime, it was said that she was from the Kurasabe clan, (please excuse my spelling), who else knew that Aika was the mage of exodus [SPOILER for fans reading the comment board, sorry] ?

Another question pertaining to Blast of Tempest and you- What is your favorite Shakespeare play?

Have you drawn inspiration from any of your friends or family members for the personalities/appearances/life circumstances of any of the characters from your scripts, and if so, what were their reactions when they found out?

You have been credited with "Series Composition" on many projects. What does that responsibility entail and how do you lead a team of writers like deciding who writes which episodes and how many scripts you write yourself?

I have to say that I enjoyed Hanasaku Iroha very much and would recommend anyone who hasn't watched it yet to give it a try!

To Mari Okada - You have written for many popular animes such as Anohana, Hanasaku Iroha, Blast of Tempest, Gosick, AKB0048, and The Pet Girl of Sakurasou just to name a few of the more recent ones. Your resume is quite impressive - in fact I am a big fan of many of your works. I imagine being able to do what you love and write stories for amazing series such as these is reward enough for you. The question I pose to you is how do you feel when the works you've written for receive critical acclaim or even in a few cases considered to be masterpieces (ex. Anohana) in the anime industry? To further add to the question, you won the Kobe Animation Award in 2011 for Anohana - how does it feel when your hard work gets recognized like this?

"Not just in Hanasaku Iroha but having written the script for numerous anime with characters that go through a major transformation by the end of the series, do you ever feel as though one of those characters has made an impact on you?"

Also

"I've noticed you have written a lot of scripts for drama/slice of life anime. Is this your favorite genre to work with? If not which is and why?"

In the process of creating a new work do the characters develop first in your mind and the environment and situation develops from the characters or does the reverse happen? The environment and situation come first to mind and the characters develop inside that framework? Or does somewhat of both happen at the same time with the characters influencing the scenario and the scenario influencing and changing the characters at the same time?